I’ve decided to create a more regular series of posts I aim to get out weekly (or at a less frequent interval) since I’ve wanted to write stuff outside things I have planned. I thought—what better way than to start it off on the first Saturday of 2026?
Synaptic Saturday will be this new series where I talk about random musings I’ve had this past week. Whoever reads this, I hope this doesn’t get stuck at the first few editions!
The flu
At the time of writing (2026 Jan 03), I’m currently sick with the flu. I feel like absolute shit, my whole body is mildly sore, and general malaise is in the air. However, the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak1, so here you are with the post.
On backlogs
I’ll be paraphrasing a quote here: “the world runs on credit.” To a certain extent, I do loosely believe that money doesn’t make the world go round—debt does. And if you go down the layers of abstraction (from “the world” to “each country” and eventually “each person”), I propose that our individual lives are nontrivially driven by debt; be it in the form of financial loans or in the form of backlogs.
I know it’s a bit far-fetched and getting too philosophical, but here are some questions to ask yourself: what is life without backlogs? If a backlog doesn’t have this ethereal, internally-defined, highly adjustable deadline, would it be a backlog in the first place? Whatever your answers are, there is one thing undeniable—that I just spent two paragraphs verbally procrastinating in this post already.
YouTube backlog
I actually have some recorded footage that need to be edited (which is very time-consuming, honestly I wouldn’t mind a decent AI tool that would help me do this). Here are a few top-of-mind:
- Full ~65 hours of Baldur’s Gate 3 footage of an Honor Mode run I played with Lance. He was running a Drow warlock / paladin (or some CHA class, he did respec a number of times in the run). I ran a Tavern Brawler thrower (the usual 5/4/3 barb/rogue/fighter multiclass).
- Three 1-2-hour episodes worth of Whiskerwood. Then, I need to record the following:
- The last episode or two for the The Farmer was Replaced series, focusing on parallel programming.
- More Whiskerwood—I havent played since the last few patches which change the game quite significantly. Editing videos, particularly editing gameplay footage is such a slog. As I’ve told Sharlene some time ago: I’m starting to get why some gaming YouTubers basically just upload a 3 to 6-hour-long VOD-style thing for their channels, because I ain’t watching all that shit to trim it down a dozen or two minutes for everyone else.
Kidding aside, I’ve also invested in an Elgato Stream Deck, which I hope to write more about in the future. But it hasn’t been with me long yet, so that will have to wait. With the new toy though, it’s way easier to add chapter markers on OBS for the advanced MP4 format.
The only problem is that this “new” MP4 format isn’t supported by Premiere Pro. Any. Version. Of it. I’d have to find a workaround to continue working on Premiere Pro with the new markers, or make the jump to DaVinci Resolve where the new format is supported. Bummer.
Gaming backlog
It’s also (still) the Steam Winter Sale, lasting until January 6th. Here are some games I’ve bought then:
- Kingdom Come: Deliverance II. My mainstay for now. Playing this the most often (with breaks in-between) since I loved KCD1 and want to see its story to the end the most.
- Endless Legend II. Also loved its predecessor when I was in high school. Would come back to playing this when I get the turn-based 4X itch (or when multiplayer gets released).
- Last Call BBS, Infinifactory, Kaizen, and other Zachtronics(-like) games. Scratches the cerebral game itch. Of course, all of the above will deserve their reviews on this site when I get to them. And speaking of criticism…
On the Expedition 33 award sweep, AI drama
I’m genuinely unsure how blown out of proportion the like-hate ratio is for the recent Game Awards. Out of all top three contenders for Game of the Year (GOTY for the uninitiated), I’ve played both E33 and Silksong on release (thanks for this, Gerald!), and KCD2 just now.
I’ll wholeheartedly agree on the sweep, but I do agree that there needs to be more categories for the awards. Jesus, the gaming industry is several times larger than the box office movie industry, but can’t we have a standalone award for “Best 4X” or “Best insert genre here?” How the hell did Ivalice Chronicles win Best Sim/Strategy?
E33 definitely has GOTY material IMO. Me and most of my friends hands down called it the moment we finished it ‘round May of last year. The synthesis of everything is definitely larger than its parts—the gameplay, the music, the art direction, and of course, the story. It is technically indie and technically a debut game (which is why I bought it on release in the first place, support indie!), so it does have all the rights to win in those categories as well. Not to mention it’s been in development for around six years.
Why not Silksong or KCD2? I’ll give it to you bluntly: while both games are absolutely fantastic, there’s nothing really new about them. A game that wins awards has to feel novel, has to feel “wow, we’ve never thought of this before.”
I’ll definitely get a lot of flak for saying Silksong is basically just the OG Hollow Knight with new content, likewise with KCD2. Sure, there’s a significant amount of “new shit” but they’re not totally new shit. The familiarity bias surely played a role here. With E33: no one made turn-based parrying work before. Fresh pieces by Lorien Testard (which I have on Spotify too) break long-held stereotypes for JRPG music. Hell, even the world building for a completely new art-based French IP is exceptionally done.
The general discord among gamers for the 2025 awards season doesn’t really concern me as E33 definitely deserves the wins. However, recent flak due to a misplaced asset that was AI-generated, I’d say, is: (1) quite the exaggeration, (2) indicative of Indie Game Awards’ misplaced virtue signaling, and (3) tells you the lengths people in power go to to slander competition rather than focus on development.
Work backlog
My current employment at Apkudo is quite restrictive when it comes to sharing company affairs (of course), but I can talk about work that needs to be done for my alma mater (UP Diliman). We’re currently doing a revamp of UVLe (the University’s LMS) as it’s high time to move on to a newer version of Moodle (for reference, the Moodle version UP still is using is around 4-5 years old).
For that, I need to work on updating the CRS (the enrollment system) <> UVLe integration. If any student, current or former, is reading this—yes, around 80-90% of the courses on UVLe are automagically made via CRS. The “shortname” is a dead giveaway (when it’s formatted like AY20XX-20XY....). There are major updates to Moodle code so some endpoints need to be updated. I’ll have to get that done before this new UVLe version goes live.
On 2026 and resolutions
I… don’t believe in New Year’s resolutions. I follow this theme system by CGPGrey since I’ve dropped out of grad school in 2023. While I’ve been a fan of CGPGrey since forever (that video came out in 2020, 2 years away from me graduating), I’ve found no use of the system until I left college, and the formerly rigid routine the institution imposes via curricula fades away into adulthood.
Maybe that’s why people set resolutions? Since there’s somehow no other time or place in their lives to set goals? And the year += 1 is a good excuse to set one! In my opinion, a year is too long of an interval and a resolution too big of a commitment (objectively, might I add), so I do recommend looking at the theme system linked above.
As for me, I’d say the theme should be “health” since I’m severely out of shape since August 2025 (roughly a quarter ago), but we’ll see what I come up with.
What’s your theme?
Footnotes
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I’m agnostic, but I’m paraphrasing Matthew 26
. Yes, I’m aware. ↩